Part Ten: The truth finally exposed. My sputum culture was not normal.

A few minutes after 2 p.m., I press my call light. I need to get up and use the shiny silver toilet. My nurse enters my room and is helping me get unhooked from all my monitors. Before I am able to slip out of bed, an infectious disease (ID) fellow walks into my room. I am surprised to see this doctor. I had just seen her two weeks ago when I saw my ID doctor. If I would not have been in the hospital, I probably would have seen her again this morning when I attended my appointment with my ID doctor. I decide to forego my need to empty my bladder. I lean back in bed and hook myself back up to my monitors.

The fellow asks me about my symptoms. She asks me if I have/had a headache. I say, "Yes. And a stiff neck too." She then asks if I have had any confusion. Her words startle me. Headache, stiff neck and confusion. Meningitis!? No, that could not be...could it? (For the last several weeks, I have had a headache which has gotten worse day by day. Confusion spells have plagued my days, and most recently I have developed a stiff, sore neck. Yes, it seems, the bacterium caused meningitis.) The fellow goes on to say my sputum culture from two weeks ago was not negative, as I had been told. It was growing a rare bacterium. My ID doctor decided the bacterium was just a normal part of my respiratory flora (although this bacterium has NEVER been cultured from my respiratory tract before).

I feel as though I am in a free fall. A million thoughts and questions race through my mind. What!? I have a rare bacterium growing in my respiratory tract, and no one told me about it! How can this be? I have been lied to. My sputum culture was not normal. Why didn't my ID doctor call me with the results like he told me he was going to? Knowing I had this new bacterium, why did my pulmonologist say I was not sick at my appointment with her? Why were all my symptoms brushed aside? My head spins.

I ask the fellow the name of the bacterium. To my surprise, the bacterium has two names, and the fellow knows both of them: Chryseobacterium meningosepticum and Elizabethkingia meningoseptica. Being completely unfamiliar with both names, I focus in on the second name--Elizabeth something or another.

The fellow is frustrated a sputum culture was not taken while in the emergency department (ED). Now, I have been on antibiotics for two days. A sputum culture collected now will not be resulted for 4-5 days. Additionally, the sputum sample may not grow anything or may have a different antibiotic sensitivity report now that I have been on antibiotics. The doctor tells me they will probably treat my old pseudomonas infection and now also this new bacterium as they do not know which organism may be making me sick. She says she will make her suggestions and note them on my chart for my medical team.

When the physician leaves, I immediately pull out my iPad and search "Elizabeth gram negative". Immediately, the bacterium Elizabethkingia meningoseptica appears on my results page. I click on several of the links and start reading everything I can about this bacterium. Some fast facts: the bacterium is extremely rare. The bacterium causes pneumonia, meningitis and sepsis. It is mostly hospital acquired and is very deadly. (I read a case report about an outbreak affecting four patients. Three of the patients died.) The bacterium is extremely drug resistant. There are only five antibiotics which can be used to treat the infection. However, the bacterium being very drug resistant, may not be inhibited by these antibiotics. Most people die from this bacterium because they are not started on the correct antibiotics. Since it takes 4-5 days for cultures to be resulted, the infection may kill the person before the correct antibiotics are commenced.

When I read this last fact, I praise God I had a sputum culture taken two weeks ago. We have the results. I can immediately be switched over to the proper antibiotic treatment. Oh how blessed I am we do not have to wait 4-5 days for another culture to be resulted. As heart broken as I was about my ID doctor not calling me and not being told my culture results, I am at this moment praising God I am alive. I praise God I went to the ED. Who knew my lungs were harboring such a deadly bacterium...a deadly bacterium which could have easily killed me. Praising God I am still alive!



(Link to Part Eleven, please click here)